He's the kinda guy I like but I can see why others wouldn't like him, although Tom's argument that his voice is fake seems kinda weird and immaterial. I thought changing your appearance in order to make yourself more entertaining/compelling/whatever was the point of art or entertainment. For Tom to complain about a musician changing his appearance from "real life" in light of the recent Bowie obsession seems REALLY strange and ironic to me, but whatever. I'm not trying to change anyone's mind, I just like arguing about stuff like this because I'm a nerd.

This is brilliant, but the answer to it will always be "Yeah, but X adopts a persona that I like while Y doesn't." In matters of taste it's just damn near impossible to convince anyone that they're guilty of a double standard. What's really ironic here is that it actually seems the offstage Waits really is a lot like what you see when he's performing. At least he never seems to let that persona slip, in interviews, documentary evidence, stories told about him, etc. What his family sees is another matter, I'm sure.

I absolutely love him. He's a songwriting, arranging, and performing genius, and also the funniest man in popular music.

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"Another thing that interests me about The Eagles is that I hate them." -- Robert Christgau

Now Tom Waits ... I dunno. I don't think I hate him necessarily, more like I'm not interested in him. Even when I liked him a long time ago, I don't think I loved him.

What's really strange is that I'd never really heard of anyone NOT liking Tom Waits until I started listening, and now I appear to be in the minority for liking him.

He's the kinda guy I like but I can see why others wouldn't like him, although Tom's argument that his voice is fake seems kinda weird and immaterial. I thought changing your appearance in order to make yourself more entertaining/compelling/whatever was the point of art or entertainment. For Tom to complain about a musician changing his appearance from "real life" in light of the recent Bowie obsession seems REALLY strange and ironic to me, but whatever. I'm not trying to change anyone's mind, I just like arguing about stuff like this because I'm a nerd.

Kind of reminds me of Aimee Mann's story about bob Dylan claiming he hated songs that tell stories...

Now Tom Waits ... I dunno. I don't think I hate him necessarily, more like I'm not interested in him. Even when I liked him a long time ago, I don't think I loved him.

What's really strange is that I'd never really heard of anyone NOT liking Tom Waits until I started listening, and now I appear to be in the minority for liking him.

He's the kinda guy I like but I can see why others wouldn't like him, although Tom's argument that his voice is fake seems kinda weird and immaterial. I thought changing your appearance in order to make yourself more entertaining/compelling/whatever was the point of art or entertainment. For Tom to complain about a musician changing his appearance from "real life" in light of the recent Bowie obsession seems REALLY strange and ironic to me, but whatever. I'm not trying to change anyone's mind, I just like arguing about stuff like this because I'm a nerd.

I pretty much agree with this. I think Swordfishtrombones through Bone Machine is an incredible run of albums. However, I re-watched the tres 80s Waits concert film, BIG TIME, on Netflix Instant recently and thought it really amplified the embarassing aspects of his schtick.

You know, I hold a grudge against that movie. I saw him on that tour and it was amazing. It's nice that somebody tried to document it, but that guy did a lousy job. The concert had a completely different feeling, because it was the work of a real band, a top-notch one with a charismatic front man. The film consistently ignores the band, holding close-ups on Waits for the entire duration of songs, actually cutting away from the stage for some dumb fictionalized schtick while Ribot or whoever is doing a crucial solo.

I've seen Waits probably 15-16 times and he's never been less than fantastic. Probably the worst performance I've ever seen by him was...well, the one in BIG TIME.

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"Another thing that interests me about The Eagles is that I hate them." -- Robert Christgau